Post by Logan on Jan 26, 2016 14:10:42 GMT -6
Boston business groups yesterday welcomed House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo’s remarks that he won’t be pushing to boost the state’s minimum wage anytime soon after the Legislature’s recent vote to hike the hourly rate to $11 by 2017.
DeLeo’s comments come amid a national union-backed “Fight for $15” movement to raise the minimum hourly rate for low-wage workers, and follow Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh’s announcement that he would form a task force of business and labor to study a $15-an-hour minimum wage for Boston.
“I quite frankly can’t see us revisiting that particular issue,” DeLeo told State House News Thursday. “Obviously it sounds good, and a lot of folks, I think, deserve that $15 an hour. Having said that, we just went through an extensive … debate on this issue, wherein we came up with a formula, which was accepted by all folks, and it made Massachusetts the highest minimum wage in the nation.”
DeLeo has adopted a “very prudent approach” to the state’s minimum wage, said Christopher Geehern, spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the state’s largest employer group. “We are, after all, in the middle of a three-year stepped increase in the minimum wage, so I think it’s wise to let employers — particularly small employers — try to absorb those increases before we start ... talking about $15 an hour.”
Read more: www.bostonherald.com/business/business_markets/2016/01/deleo_state_won_t_debate_boost_to_15_anytime_soon
DeLeo’s comments come amid a national union-backed “Fight for $15” movement to raise the minimum hourly rate for low-wage workers, and follow Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh’s announcement that he would form a task force of business and labor to study a $15-an-hour minimum wage for Boston.
“I quite frankly can’t see us revisiting that particular issue,” DeLeo told State House News Thursday. “Obviously it sounds good, and a lot of folks, I think, deserve that $15 an hour. Having said that, we just went through an extensive … debate on this issue, wherein we came up with a formula, which was accepted by all folks, and it made Massachusetts the highest minimum wage in the nation.”
DeLeo has adopted a “very prudent approach” to the state’s minimum wage, said Christopher Geehern, spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the state’s largest employer group. “We are, after all, in the middle of a three-year stepped increase in the minimum wage, so I think it’s wise to let employers — particularly small employers — try to absorb those increases before we start ... talking about $15 an hour.”
Read more: www.bostonherald.com/business/business_markets/2016/01/deleo_state_won_t_debate_boost_to_15_anytime_soon